/*
 * Copyright (C) 2011 Google Inc.
 *
 * Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License"); you may not
 * use this file except in compliance with the License. You may obtain a copy of
 * the License at
 *
 * http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
 *
 * Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
 * distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT
 * WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. See the
 * License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations under
 * the License.
 */

package org.ros.message;

import org.jboss.netty.buffer.ChannelBuffer;

/**
 * @author damonkohler@google.com (Damon Kohler)
 *
 * @param <T>
 *          the type of message that the {@link MessageSerializer} can serialize
 */
public interface MessageSerializer<T> {

  /**
   * Serialize the message into a dynamically allocated channel buffer.
   *
   * @param message
   *          message to serialize
   * @return
   *          channel buffer containing serialized content
   */
  ChannelBuffer serialize(T message);

  /**
   * Serialize the given message into the provided channel buffer.
   *
   * @param message
   *           message to serialize
   * @param buffer
   *           output buffer to use for serialization
   */
  void serialize(T message, ChannelBuffer buffer);

}
